May Summary and Plans for June

I finished 14 books in May. I was unable to resist the Orange list and so my reading was dominated by books from it. Unfortunately I don’t seem to have the same taste in books as the Orange judges this year – I’ll post a full summary of my thoughts on the Orange short list at some point in the next week, but overall I was quite disappointed.

I noticed that all the books I read were relatively new. I am disappointed by the lack of older books and so intend to concentrate on reading a few next month.

Plans for June

The Booker long list isn’t announced until 27th July, so I am going to enjoy a brief period of time without a book prize list to work from! I’m going to try to read a few of the books that I wanted to read in May and then focus on some international reads. I hope to squeeze in a few science fiction reads too!

49 Comments

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Oyeyemi is one of my favourite writers at the moment. I think she has made tremendous strides forward since she first came onto the book scene with ‘The Icarus Girl’. I was working with secondary teachers at the time and I would push it under their noses mercilessly. Definitely read ‘White is for Witching’.

tea lady, I haven’t read any Maggie Farrell before, so was really torn as to whether I should read Esme or her new one. In the end I decided that Esme seems to be a modern classic and so should start with that one. I hope that I enjoy it as much as everyone else seems to.

Iris, I don’t expect to read them all – I just like to have a nice big pool of books to choose from My husband is away a lot in June though, so I do expect to have a lot of free time this month to get more reading done than usual.

I will be reading How Late it Was, how Late in June myself. It’s my second attempt — the first time I just wasn’t in the mood for it. I must tell you, I read the Jelinek and didn’t care for it. But you often see things I don’t, so I’m looking forward to your review.

You have such a respectable reading list! I love that you tackle those prize lists with such vigour! I have The Piano Teacher on my shelves right now. A good friend of mine listened to the audio, and said it was very good, so I will probably have to pull it out and place it in the short stack soon!

i really enjoyed dan’s book last year ,palace walk mean to be good ,i m embarking on some arab reading this month ,also grass have to read he is one of my favourite writer and the new translation of tin drum meant be wonderful ,all the best stu

I haven’t read any of these, but I don’t tend to read books that have won prizes because that doesn’t always mean that they’re good. I tend to choose books that have a great synopsis that piques my interest and I read reviews (good and bad) because that’s how I know if I will like them or not. And my strategy works 90 % of the time. I rarely pick up a book that I won’t like.

Andreea, I’m afraid that I have a bit of an addiction to prize lists. I’m terrible at knowing whether or not I’ll enjoy a book from the premise alone so I like working my way through prize lists. Reading books I don’t enjoy helps me to learn what I do and don’t like in books. It is great that you can predict whether or not you’ll enjoy a book though

I’m looking forward to working through the Orange longlist and the last two of this year’s Pulitzer fiction before the Booker longlist. Of course, if it’s like last year, most won’t be available in the U.S. yet, which makes it much more difficult. Happy June reading!

Carrie, I’m really excited about the Booker list this year. I have read a lot of potential contenders already and will be very interested to see what makes the list. I look forward to comparing notes with you.

I’m glad you’re reading Palace Walk. I read the trilogy two years ago, and the books are memorable. I’m curous what your take on it will be.
The Tin Drum keeps showing up on blog discussions, so I probably should read it sometime soon this summer. And that would give me a chance to read more German fiction.
The only science fiction I’ve read recently is Kim Stanley Robinson’s Mars Trilogy, which attempts to portray the settlement and terraforming of Mars in mostly realistic terms. Although Robinson periodically bogs down the narrative with scientific description, the first book tells a pretty interesting story. Hope you enjoy your SF and world literature reads this summer.

Mome Rath, I must be reading different blogs to you as I haven’t seen any Tin Drum discussions. I’ll have to go and seek them out once I start reading. I’ve just discovered that Tin Drum is very long, so it might take a while to get through, but I am very intrigued.

I’d be very interested to know what you think of A Life Apart, Ilustrado, The Piano Teacher, The Surrendered, Ender’s Game, How Late it was how late, and Esme Lennox. By the way I’d like to add for a good sci-fi, I heard about The Windup Girl by Paolo Bacigalupi from Books on the Nightstand yesterday and it looks promising.

I very rarely disregard an author for their beliefs or politics, but Orson Scott Card is one who I won’t read. I can take his views on evolution and global warming, but won’t read him because of his views on homosexuality.

From what I’ve heard, A Life Apart is a must-read. And I’m excited that you’re planning on reading some Gowdy! I actually haven’t read The White Bone yet, so I might have to try to get a hold of that one too.

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My Rating System

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Note: All books on this blog are rated on a five star system according to how much I enjoyed them. The ratings are not an indication of writing quality nor how enjoyable you may find reading them.
I am notoriously fussy in my reading tastes, so the star rating will only help if you have a similar reading taste to mine. I tend to abandon books I am not enjoying.